![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEC_306588736-6d47-e1785393769739.jpg\")
\n\t\tThe Strokes\u2019 Is This It is widely regarded as one of the most influential of all time (Picture: Getty\/Metro)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\tThe Strokes\u2019 Is This It is widely regarded as one of the most influential of all time (Picture: Getty\/Metro)<\/p>\n
It was the album that made guitar music \u2018cool\u2019 again and birthed a new era of indie kids wearing skinny jeans, denim jackets and worn-out Converse.<\/p>\n
Today marks 25 years since The Strokes\u2019 seminal debut Is This It was first unleashed onto the world.<\/p>\n
Julian Casablancas, Albert Hammond Jr, Nick Valensi, Fabrizo Moretti and Nikolai Fraiture were quickly catapulted from young New York<\/a> City upstarts to rock \u2018n\u2019 roll royalty thanks to the stratospheric success of singles Last Nite, Hard to Explain and Someday.\u00a0<\/p>\n Is This It made it to number two on the UK album charts and peaked at 33 in the US<\/a> Billboard 200.<\/p>\n \t\t While it enjoyed monster success on both sides of the Atlantic, it was actually released first in Australia<\/a> on July 30, 2001. <\/p>\n Two and a half decades later, the album is widely considered to be one of the most influential of all time thanks to its unmistakable distorted guitar sound and famous cover, which features a gloved hand resting on a woman\u2019s rear and hip.\u00a0<\/p>\n Its popularity ushered in a new generation of guitar bands, influencing the likes of Arctic<\/a> Monkeys and The Killers, and helped revive the indie disco club night.\u00a0<\/p>\n \t\t Here, Metro talks to key industry figures and those involved in Is This It\u2019s legacy for their memories of its release and why it\u2019s so revered.<\/p>\n Gordon Raphael, who now lives in London<\/a>, produced the record between March and April 2001 from his basement studio in New York\u2019s East Village, after the band generated a major buzz with their debut EP The Modern Age.<\/p>\n \u2018Guitar music was very unfashionable. I thought these guys really tried hard, they were doing some interesting stuff and I really like them, but this is the wrong time\u2019, Gordon told Metro.<\/p>\n \u2018They were learning but they were also extremely smart and very well prepared. They were also New York tough. You couldn\u2019t tell them something was orange if it was brown. They knew what was going on, and they were very aware of every musical detail.<\/p>\n \t\t \u2018They were really great musicians, and they had a higher standard of perfection than almost any band I\u2019d worked with or even been in \u2013 they weren\u2019t going to let anything slip whatsoever. No fast notes, wrong notes, wrong tones. They were just not having it, so I had to really work<\/a> hard to keep up with them.<\/p>\n \u2018The amazing thing was, even when we started making the album, I could feel the whole world watching. There was so much buzz about this New York band that had never even played at a big club in New York, and here they were touring in the UK, and signed on a label. It was a huge buzz.\u2019<\/p>\n Legendary radio<\/a> DJ Steve Lamacq told Metro how the key to The Strokes\u2019 success was how \u2018effortless\u2019 they were.<\/p>\n Affectionately nicknamed Lammo, he was host of Lamacq Live on BBC<\/a> Radio 1 when Is This It was released.<\/p>\n He told Metro: \u2018Is This It is the record which informs everything on both sides of the Atlantic, in terms of guitar bands, for the rest of the decade because The Strokes begat The Libertines, who are then an influence on the Arctic Monkeys, and that\u2019s the noughties. <\/p>\n \u2018All the big guitar bands of the noughties start with The Strokes\u2019 debut album.<\/p>\n \t\t \u2018All around the country you had groups like The Cribs and Maximo Park arriving, Franz Ferdinand doing something else from Glasgow.\u00a0All of a sudden, there was a whole batch of new, interesting bands doing something slightly different.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018The Strokes were the head of a wave that reinvented our indie discos.\u00a0They opened up the dance floor again to people who wanted to dance to guitar records. Everyone then came with these Indie anthems we still dance to now\u00a0 \u2013 whether it\u2019s Take Me Out by Franz Ferdinand or Time for Heroes by The Libertines. The first domino was pushed by The Strokes.\u2019<\/p>\n They felt so uncontrived.\u00a0They were sharp looking but, at the same time, looked like they\u2019d just got up, and that\u2019s an amazing trick to pull off.\u00a0They didn\u2019t feel like they were having to try \u2013 they were just The Strokes<\/p>\n Quote Felix White, guitarist with The Maccabees, says the emergence of The Strokes was a real lightbulb moment for his band.<\/p>\n \u2018Because of the NME and music being less accessible, I\u2019d read lots about The Strokes before I\u2019d even heard them,\u2019 Felix told Metro.\u00a0\u2018It\u2019s interesting to think about in hindsight because you don\u2019t get any of the myth building or mysticism with groups these days. <\/p>\n \u2018When I first heard The Strokes, The Maccabees had just got going.\u00a0It was like hearing a guitar band where the music fitted together like a jigsaw puzzle.<\/p>\n \t\t \u2018Others would have taken the leather jackets, holes in the jeans and walking on stage with a beer, but for us it was more about the way the music had been clearly put together, thought about and arranged.<\/p>\n \u2018Probably with most of the bands around that time, being in love with the music and listening to it everyday, realising guitar music can make you feel this way, but trying not to sound exactly like The Strokes was the battle!<\/p>\n \u2018We supported The Strokes on the First Impressions of Earth tour a few years later.\u00a0We played with them at the Brighton Centre and it was an extremely overwhelming experience for me, personally.\u00a0We walked into the arena to them sound checking.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018They were so perfectly silhouetted that they didn\u2019t seem real.\u00a0They came and watched us and seeing those silhouettes again on the side of the stage was really cool \u2013 it was magical.\u2019<\/p>\n The music journalist: Conor McNicholas, former NME editor<\/p>\n Conor McNicholas was editor of NME from 2002 to 2009 when The Strokes were at the top of their game. <\/p>\n \u2018I started on the NME at Reading Festival in 2002. The Strokes were barely a year old in pop culture, but they were headlining the Friday night over Pulp \u2013 a real changing of the guard moment\u2019, he told Metro.<\/p>\n \u2018I\u2019d been tasked with reviewing the gig. First job \u2013 capture an iconic moment of triumph. No pressure.<\/p>\n \t\t \u2018After that The Strokes were a job. They were the biggest-selling cover artists in my early years so the job was to get the most out of them that I could.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018There was \u201cbefore The Strokes\u201d and \u201cafter The Strokes\u201d, no question.\u00a0The album was a defining moment \u2013 a complete transition.\u00a0It\u2019s how it must have felt when The Beatles turned up.<\/p>\n \u2018Instantly, being in a band was cool again.\u00a0Kids changed their clothes and picked up guitars.\u00a0Within a year we had Franz Ferdinand and the UK scene really kicked off.\u00a0It all happened very quickly.\u2019<\/p>\n \t\t\t\tThe Strokes wannabe: Rory McKeown\t\t\t<\/p>\n I admit it \u2013 I\u2019m a 40-year-old millennial indie kid who still wears skinny jeans and denim jackets.<\/p>\n This is in no doubt thanks to Julian Casablancas and the rest of The Strokes who just exuded cool when they hit the scene in 2001.<\/p>\n Cue me and thousands of others trying to replicate their look at sweaty indie discos up and down the country.<\/p>\n As Alex Turner once sang: \u2018I just wanted to be one of The Strokes\u2019.<\/p>\n Is This It was a game changer when it was released, spawning the major hit Last Nite.<\/p>\n I couldn\u2019t get enough of the track and its video, which was on regular rotation on MTV2 in the early 2000s and then parodied by Sum 41.\u00a0<\/p>\n Steve Lamacq\u2019s right when he says The Strokes were \u2018effortless\u2019.\u00a0 That just out of bed look was part of their charm.\u00a0 They were a band who already looked like giants of rock \u2018n\u2019 roll \u2013 and sounded like it.<\/p>\n It\u2019s why Is This It is, and will always be, a timeless classic.\u00a0<\/p>\n Arrow Arrow Arrow![\"A9TR8R](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_306585904-642d.jpg\")
\n\t\tThe Strokes pictured performing in Rotterdam in 2001, the year they released Is This It (Picture: Alamy Stock Photo)<\/p>\n![\"3CK8G2B](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_306585907-3504.jpg\")
\n\t\tSimple yet memorable, the album cover of Is This It is now one of the most iconic in music (Picture: Alamy Stock Photo)<\/p>\n![\"Mandatory](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_306585994-0a99.jpg\")
\n\t\t\u2018The amazing thing was, even when we started making the album, I could feel the whole world watching\u2019, Is This It producer Gordon Raphael told Metro (Picture: Earl Gibson III\/Shutterstock)<\/p>\n![\"Steve](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_193717391-6948.jpg\")
\n\t\tSteve Lamacq says The Strokes helped open up the dance floor to those who wanted to dance to guitar records (Picture: Victoria Jones\/PA Wire)<\/p>\n
\nQuote<\/p>\n![\"BRISTOL,](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_306196824-c9ba.jpg\")
\n\t\tThe Maccabees\u2019s Felix White performing at the Bristol Amphitheatre.He says his band were inspired by the way The Strokes put the music together (Picture: Redferns)<\/p>\n![\"2F1FA7C](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/SEI_306585902-82f9-e1785248918182.jpg\")
\n\t\tConor McNicholas pictured during his days as NME editor (Picture: Alamy Stock Photo)<\/p>\n
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